


Home

by LittleQuail



Category: Portal (Video Game)
Genre: Fluff, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-21
Updated: 2016-05-21
Packaged: 2018-06-09 17:38:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,008
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6916891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleQuail/pseuds/LittleQuail
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Based off of the prompt:</p>
<p>“You can go home…”</p>
<p>“My only home is you.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Home

**Author's Note:**

> i dont think ive ever written portal fanfiction before! so excuse my bad writing but uh  
> friend requested glados and chell and i had this prompt up and it just fit.... 
> 
> enjoy!!

It was over.

All the testing, all the obstacles, all the near-death experiences. Over. She could leave.

When the door had opened, a warm breeze had washed in, the sun kissing her skin for the first time in years. Her eyes burned in the light, but it was a welcome feeling. She could feel tears running down her face, and she couldn’t tell if it was from the brightness, or simply from joy.

Her first step was hesitant, unsure if what she was seeing was real. The sun could be simulated, that she had learned. The sounds, computer generated. But it was the smell that drew her in. The fresh wheat, the warmth, the dirt, all mixed together to create… the smell of life. Her next step was much quicker, and those that followed were as well, until she was completely outside. 

The heat wrapped around her body, going straight to her heart, leaving her with a surge of hope and reassurance that this was the end, yet, the beginning. A deep breath in and her lungs were filled with fresh air, not pumped in from anywhere but the Earth itself. It felt almost too good to be true.

..Was it?

She jumped at the loud slam of the metal door closing, turning back around quickly. It was official now. No going back. Determination filled her being as she pivoted to face her new life out in the real world, though a small bit of worry tugged at her. As she took one more step forward, that anxiousness pulled harder at her mind and she had a thought. 

For the first time in many years, she was alone. No one to tell her where to go, what to do, what to solve, nothing. There wasn’t even a path leading out of this field. Suddenly she had her doubts. Was this really a good idea? She’d never really been on her own before. What would she find at the end of the field? Did people even live near here? It had been so long, was everyone even still alive? As she thought more and more she realized that her little life inside Aperture at least had a place to stay, and company. 

GLaDOS didn’t want her back, though. She had made that very clear. Maybe she could try and reason with her - if anyone knew what the current condition of the human population, it would be the super-computer inside. 

She turned back around and shyly knocked on the large metal door, the sound echoing inside. The security camera outside of it swiveled to focus on her, the lens zooming in and out noisily. 

“I said ‘don’t come back’, didn’t I? Shoo. You can go home.”

Chell sighed and rested her head on the door, the metal cooling her skin. She turned her head to the camera, hoping that her next action would be captured.

She cleared her throat. “My only home…. Is you.” Her voice was weak from disuse, but it was still there. 

Silence hung in the air as the robot took in both her statement and the sound. Chell’s stomach twisted with nerves. What would she do if the robot didn’t let her back in? There didn’t seem to be much out there for her, and being by herself wouldn’t make anything easier. The sound of the door moving slightly interrupted her train of thought.

It opened slowly, the elevator waiting for her right where she left it. She rushed in, tears pricking her eyes as she realized that all of her memories, good and bad, were here, in Aperture. She couldn’t leave behind this place, not for a second. She had seen the outside, felt it. That was good enough for now. 

The elevator started its descent, much quieter this time as all the turrets had been moved away. It came to the end of its drop and she stepped out, the robot simply looking at her with a blank stare. Finally, after a long stretch of silence, it was broken. 

“Do you really believe that? After all that I’ve done to try and kill you? Again and again and again? And after every attempt to destroy me? This is where you’d rather be?” GLaDOS tilted her headpiece in curiousity, her voice steady until the end, a break in her confidence. 

Chell began to reminiscence about Aperture. Her first day awake in the center, being thrown into the testing program with little to no knowledge of the experiments that laid before her. The first time she had created a portal, and the power she felt with the little gun. Flying through the air, “like a bird piloting a jet”. She chuckled as she remembered the little sarcastic quips the robot always seemed to had for her. Throughout everything, going through old Aperture, dealing with Wheatley, and almost destroying the robot several times, GLaDOS was always there with a little remark that brought a smile to her face. 

She nodded, slowly at first, then more forcefully as she started crying and smiling, the memories enveloping her in a warmth no sun could provide. She walked up to the large robot, hugging the bottom part that she could reach, resting her head on the plastic. 

While she was going through this turbulence of feelings, GLaDOS herself was playing back her memories of the recent days. What would she have done without Chell? That little human had survived much more than she would have ever thought, and although most of her was telling her to kill the human as she had caused much more damage than she should have, a little bit of her was telling her it was okay. That it was okay to have a live human here. That she wouldn’t hurt her anymore. That she could put her trust in someone again. 

With that, she lowered her head and closed her eye, nudging Chell back in the closest thing to a hug as she could manage. Chell’s grin grew and her heart soared.

She was home.


End file.
